The sun was setting by the time Dia came to, her body still trembling from the sheer outburst of lifeforce released by the ancient battlefield. Her body was aching all over, and she could vaguely detect a vast resource of lifeforce all around her.

“Urgh.” Dia pushed herself off the ground slowly, and then looked around her. The others were all unconscious too, save for Nero, who was now suspended in mid-air and clad in an ancient aura of black light, his presence throbbing and humming as the sun continued to set.

Nero seemed safe, if only unaware of his surroundings, so Dia turned her attention to the others. As she crawled towards Risti, her mind began to play back the events of last night.

Shortly after the three Moons fully descended, the ancient battlefield not too far from them had turned mad. Vast amounts of lifeforce surged to the heavens, smashing against the five grand skies and splattering all over the world. It was no different from directing a stream of water against a plate or something, but the sheer power behind the impact, as well as the initial shockwave of lifeforce that had blasted outwards, had knocked her and everyone else unconscious.

“Urgh.” After some agonised groans, Dia finally rolled over to Risti and started shaking her. “Wake up, Risti!”

“Mhm? Dad, give me a moment. Let me sleep in a bit more…”

Dia felt her temple throb, but she resisted the urge to jab Risti’s sides. Instead, she tickled them until Risti, who was still asleep, started to laugh and twist, and after around ten seconds, she woke up.

“Dia?” Risti groaned. “Stop tickling — yeowch. My body hurts. What happened?”

“You forgot?” Dia paused. “Never mind. Let’s wake everyone up first. We’ve been out cold for more than seventeen hours. It’s lucky that there weren’t any predators nearby, or else we would have been dead.”

Breathing heavily, she got up and surveyed their surroundings. Their base, which was made of multiple barrier artefacts, were now gleaming oddly in the sunset, and Dia rubbed her eyes. They were now green in colour, the same green that she saw in lifestones, and an odd hypothesis popped up in her head.

Was it possible that those artefacts had spontaneously mutated to form that faint green sheen? After taking another glance at her green base, she staggered over to Schwarz and flipped him over, before shaking him back and forth.

“Dad?” Schwarz muttered. “It’s not time to open the bar yet, go back to sleep.”

Dia twitched. This was the second time in short succession that someone had claimed a father-child relationship with her. Was there something in that wave of power that made people call out for their parents?

She flipped him around a few more times grumpily, which woke Schwarz up soon enough. The bartender stared at her blearily for a few more seconds, before awareness returned to his eyes.

“Dia?” Schwarz had a disappointed look on his face. “Oh. Ah…what’s going — my body really, really hurts.”

“Yeah, it would.” Dia extended a hand to him, which he took, and then lugged him onto his feet. “You were smacked by a giant shockwave of lifeforce, like everyone else. I just woke up not too long ago too.”

She turned to Risti, who was poking Farah’s sides with a branch in a bid to wake her up. Since there was a non-zero chance that Farah might actually call her Dad — although given her relationship with her irresponsible parents, that wasn’t likely — Dia wasn’t going to run the risk of damaging her mental state.

“Anyway, you should check your body and everything. That shockwave was quite bad, and you’re the weakest of the four of us.” Dia gave him an appraising gaze.

She stretched her arms and winced as her muscles flared with red-hot pain. Was that single shockwave really that terrifying? It was as if her body had undergone rapid growth or something, like that time when she first picked up the way of the sword, and—

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A thought flashed through her mind, and she opened her status.

[Name: Dia Lyceria de Lustre

Lifespan: 413 years

Active Skills: Sword Dance (7), Sword Sense (7), Sword Roar (5), Fated Sword (2), Sword Fall (2), Domain of Swords (1)

Passive Skills: Heightened Senses, Fighter’s Intuition, Foreseer’s Eye, Lifeforce Detection

Mana Circuit Superimposition: 3.28

Mana Control Proficiency: Intermediate

Authority: 3

Comments: It was unfortunate that you were slapped silly by the unsealing of the ancient battlefield, but it is a fortuitous encounter nonetheless. Have you been well recently? It seems like you’ve been busy running around…]

Dia gazed at her lifespan, which had increased by a full three hundred years, and then took a deep breath. “Guys, check your status. If I’m not wrong, everyone’s lifespan just shot up by a full three hundred years.”

She paused and looked at her passive skills. “And I just obtained the skill, Lifeforce Detection. I think you guys probably have that too.”

“Moons,” Farah murmured. “I’m not going to die anytime soon now, it seems! Wow. Well, that shockwave can hit me a few more times. I won’t mind, really.”

“Congratulations.” Schwarz looked at the ancient battlefield. “But I don’t think we’re the luckiest ones, are we? After all, we have one Holy Son who’s busy receiving power from the Black God.”

Everyone looked at Nero, whose presence was pulsing and giving off intense waves of power. Was the Black God strengthening Nero a few times over? Or was it something else? Whatever the case, Dia felt a bit more optimistic about their chances now, even if the Moons conscripted them.

The sight of a suspended Nero was a feast for the eyes, but there was no going against their tummies. For some reason, everyone was starving, but fortunately, they weren’t the only victims of the faint-inducing shockwave.

A short trip into the forest revealed multiple boars that had been knocked out entirely. Had they been left alone, they would probably turn into monsters or far stronger boars, but Dia’s sword wasn’t going to have any of that. After killing them, Schwarz and Dia brought the boars back to camp, and the four of them butchered the unfortunate animals.

Before long, huge skewers of boar meat had been set up above the firepit, which had gone out while they were unconscious, and the four of them sat around the firepit. Dia would occasionally glance at Nero, as did the others, and before long, the conversation shifted to the poor fellow again.

“Isn’t life just unfair? While we’re already awake and surrounding wild boar, Nero’s still stuck in mid-air,” Schwarz commented. “In fact, if this happened without us around, it would have been very dangerous.”

Dia nodded. “Not just very dangerous. Those boars proved it for us, right? If we hadn’t woken up early, we could have become animal food or something. You lot ought to thank me.”

She stuck her nose in the air proudly.

After a round of thanks, which soothed her ego, everyone turned to Nero again.

“He looks like he’s in pain,” Farah noted.

“Power and pain go hand in hand or something, I suppose.” Risti got up. “Is there any way we can help him?”

They approached the suspended Nero, and Dia scrutinised his face up close. The intense pressure radiating off his suspended form wasn’t doing them any favours, however, and before long, the four of them were forced back.

“Just what is going on?” Schwarz muttered. “Farah, grab a skewer. Risti, you know where my brews are. Help me take the bottles that’s inlaid with gold. I don’t believe this gluttonous drunkard can resist my offerings.”

“You aren’t holding back anything, are you?” Dia observed wryly.

“Like it or not, he’s our friend. And we don’t go to half-lengths for friends, do we?” Schwarz replied. “I’m going to wave this under his nose and pop open my bottles until he wakes up! After that, I’m going to plug those bottles back up menacingly and scold him for worrying us!”

“Alright, take a chill pill. Did that wave of lifeforce alter your mind or something? You’re normally not this agitated,” Dia replied. “Anyway, calm down. Everything’s going to be fine, and we’ll be waving these bottles in front of him gleefully.”

The two of them turned back to the groaning Nero. Black light continued to bloom from his thin frame, with every pulse drawing a pained moan from him. Fortunately, Dia had just gained a skill that would allow her to perceive lifeforce; the amount of lifeforce Nero had in his body was actually increasing slightly with every pulse.

With some luck, he might have enough lifeforce to actually create his sixth mana circuit, which was frankly unbelievable.

“His lifeforce is surging.” Dia took a step back. “Maybe disturbing him now might not be a good idea.”

“Surging?”

“Increasing,” Dia clarified. “At this rate, he’s going to be the youngest hexa-folder in all history. I’m happy to see history in the making, if nothing else. It would be one heck of a shame if we accidentally destroyed this record.”

“Are you sure?” Schwarz asked, glancing at Dia doubtfully.

“Did you not receive the Lifeforce Detection skill?” Dia asked.

“Nope.” The bartender took a step back. “Well, if he’s fine…I’m still going to bait him with drinks and food, though.”

“With friends like you, did Nero really need the Third as an enemy?”